The exhibition, titled â€œGods of Angkorâ€, will showcase more than Cambodiaâ€™s art; it is also a stage for the countryâ€™s new generation of museum conservators, who have been tasked with preserving some of Cambodiaâ€™s key archaeological heritage pieces.

Though a generation of conservators was lost during the Khmer Rouge period, the last decade has seen a new crop emerge to take its place in the National Museumâ€™s Metal Conservation Laboratory.

â€œThe exhibition is going to introduce the laboratory to the world,â€ said Cort, the curator for ceramics at the Freer and Sackler Galleries of the Smithsonian Institution and the upcoming exhibitionâ€™s co-curator.

The laboratory was launched in 2005 as part of a training partnership with the Freer and Sackler Galleries. The Smithsonian exhibition marks the first time works that have been conserved completely independently by the laboratory will be shown internationally.